any mechanics offer opinion on this?

Wig

I'm sorry, I have no idea on cost or what that part is. I speak from experience of having a taxi for a number of years and having a very reasonable knowledge of vehicle repair, and reasonable knowledge of how the law works in consumer issues.

I am not an expert in any of the above.

marksandsparx

Wig wrote: »

Again, IMO no, there is nothing you can hold against the mechanic. You cannot expect to get a guaranteed pass just because you get your vehicle examined before the test. The second mechanic had the advantage of hindsight and knew what had already been replaced.

Welcome to the joys of owning your own vehicle in business!

And remember you chose not to get it rolling road tested before the examination.

But now that the mechanic has copys of the failure sheet, and the brake test results, he should now be able to fix it fairly easily...

It seems to me that the mechanic has no real idea.. and is just "throwing" parts at in the hope that he gets it right.

It also sounds like he has a very poor customer manner.

marksandsparx

no-oneknowsme wrote: »

Thanks Wig - I appreciate your comments.

I take it you are a mechanic or know a fair bit about cars? Would you have any idea how much this problem - the pressure valve - is going to cost to put right?

The mechanic who sourced the problem yesterday and who is going to look at it on Monday morning has a rolling road and so at least when it leaves his garage on Monday we know that it *should* be ok for psv....

Funds are getting a bit stretched now though and a rough idea of how much the pressure valve is to fix would be an advantage. The car is a 2003 Skoda diesel 1.9.

Thanks

I would charge about an hour labour to replace.. plus cost of part, which would be about £40. Not fully sure about that though

Strider590

Original mechanic sounds ill equipped to deal with the issue......

Once took my car to have work done by a friend of the family who ran a garage (he'd come out of retirement), his "garage" didn't even have an inspection ramp, I went down and found my car up in the air balancing on 3 trolley jacks..... Nice chap, but I didn't use him again for fear of my car one day falling off a trolley jack and squashing him. :rotfl:

no-oneknowsme

marksandsparx wrote: »

I would charge about an hour labour to replace.. plus cost of part, which would be about £40. Not fully sure about that though

Dont understand what you mean by this sorry...
Do you mean that the part and the labour would be £40?

Or , the cost of the part alone would be £40? Then the labour charge on top?

no-oneknowsme

Strider590 wrote: »

Original mechanic sounds ill equipped to deal with the issue......quote

Couldnt agree with you more ! When i spoke to him yesterday I got the impression that he hadnt a clue what was wrong with the car and he was just going to keep changing parts (and so costing us more money and retest fee's) until he was lucky enough to source what the real problem was.

I admit that I got a bit lippy with him yesterday but this is just getting to me!

I told him that I was going to take advice on the matter to see where I stand and we ended the call with bad feeling.....ten minutes later he rung me back and said to me "have you spoke to anyone about this yet?" to which I replied "no but I fully intend to" to which he said "please dont , give me another look at your car to see if I can sort it because this kind of thing would really harm my business" to which my reply was "harm your business? and what exactly do you think this is doing to our business? Our car has been off the road for 4 days out of the past week!"

Needless to say that even though he wants us to take the car up to him again at the start of the week , we have no intentions of going back near him.

colino

Normally I'd encourage you to get the original chancer to fix it, but to be honest with you, the system isn't an unusually complex one and he has dangerously missed a major fault and originally "fixed" the handbrake by horsing up the cable adjuster. I very much doubt he is a mechanic to be unable to sort this out in a couple of hours and I wouldn't let him near the car again. Get it properly sorted out elsewhere and get a refund from him.
Usually all of the taxi boys have an independent they all use for a particular make and I'd ask around and find out who your local guy is. Usually cheap because of the regular trade and (boredom) benefit of repeating common work.

marksandsparx

no-oneknowsme wrote: »

Dont understand what you mean by this sorry...
Do you mean that the part and the labour would be £40?

Or , the cost of the part alone would be £40? Then the labour charge on top?

No, just the part would be about £40.. but has this old mechanic said thats the fault? If so I wouldn't trust that.

Earlier in your post you said that it started leaking fluid? This seems like a major problem! and to suddenly "develop" when repairing brakes is inexcusable, and VERY VERY serious. what was his excuse for that? Any component that even looks like it could potentially leak should be replaced regardless of cost.

No one seems to have picked up on that fact.

no-oneknowsme

colino wrote: »

Normally I'd encourage you to get the original chancer to fix it, but to be honest with you, the system isn't an unusually complex one and he has dangerously missed a major fault and originally "fixed" the handbrake by horsing up the cable adjuster. I very much doubt he is a mechanic to be unable to sort this out in a couple of hours and I wouldn't let him near the car again. Get it properly sorted out elsewhere and get a refund from him.
Usually all of the taxi boys have an independent they all use for a particular make and I'd ask around and find out who your local guy is. Usually cheap because of the regular trade and (boredom) benefit of repeating common work.

See , I tend to agree with what you are saying here.

The original mechanic did tighten up the handbrake cable and thought that everything would be sweet!

I did say to the mechanic on the phone yesterday that I wanted a partial refund of the money we have paid him and his response was "No chance! , You asked me to fix the car and I did....its not my fault that since I fixed it (or should that be NOT FIXED IT) the break fluid has pumped out of the rear wheel area resulting in you then needing new brake shoes and cylinder"....

But you see this is the point, i just cant get my head around the fact that this fault only occured in the 2 days after he had the car.....

The point I think he is missing is that if he is in any way responsible , I wont let this drop as the brakes failed on the car on monday whilst my Husband was driving it....the fact that he could have had a customer in the car with him just doesnt bear thinking about.

no-oneknowsme

marksandsparx wrote: »

No, just the part would be about £40.. but has this old mechanic said thats the fault? If so I wouldn't trust that.

Earlier in your post you said that it started leaking fluid? This seems like a major problem! and to suddenly "develop" when repairing brakes is inexcusable, and VERY VERY serious. what was his excuse for that? Any component that even looks like it could potentially leak should be replaced regardless of cost.

No one seems to have picked up on that fact.

Hi.

It isnt the OLD mechanic who has said that the pressure valve is at fault . On Friday afternoon after it failed the psv my Husband took it to another garage who have a rolling road. They diagnosed the fault within half an hour of having the car. They unfortunately cant fit the new part until Monday first thing.

Yes , the car has leaked all of the break fluid!

The old mechanic had the car on Wednesday 16th March and fixed a few niggly little faults . He also claims to have replaced a caliper on the passenger side and to have tightened the handbrake cable .

Then , the car failed the psv on the 18th .

We contacted the mechanic to inform him of this and he told us to bring it up to him on 23rd March so he could have another go at fixing it in preparation for the planned psv retest on 25th March (yesterday) .

However , in the meantime , Hubby was out in the car on Monday morning 21st March (at this point in time we thought the car would be ok to drive as we thought the problem with it was at most the handbrake cabele was slack) and as he was driving along he went to use his brakes and the pedal went straight to the floor :eek:

he managed to get the car home and he rung the mechanic to ask if he could bring the car up sooner than his 23rd March appointment as the brakes had failed . The mechanic said no , he couldnt fit him in any earlier than the 23rd.

On going back out to the car Hubby noticed a massive pool at the back wheel and realised that this was brake fluid :eek:

On 23rd we then got the car transported to the mechanic who fitted new brake shoes and a cylinder and assured us that this was the car up and running and ready for the re-test....

The bloody thing then failed on Friday. Hubby got another mechanic (with a rolling road) to check the brakes over and it was then that the pressure valve problem was discovered.

Because of all of this I still think that the first mechanic is partially liable. I think that he should accept *some* responsibility. I think he should have noticed something when he was working on the car previously . For the brakes to fail and the fluid to pump out all over the road I believe the fault must have been there for a while..it surely didnt just develop over night?

The first mechanic is expecting us back on Monday morning . He told me on the phone on Friday that he will "give the handbrake another wee tighten" which to me is daft because he is not investigating to see if the problem lays elsewhere..

Needless to say we will not be going any where near him on Monday but the car will be going to the second mechanic instead.

We will then take it back to the test centre in the afternoon to see if they can retest it there and then so please , keep everything crossed.

Does anyone know if there is any where I could seek advice on this matter? Are garages/mechanics regulated by anyone in particular?